The War of 1812 was a military conflict that lasted from June 1812 to February 1815, fought between the United States of America and the United Kingdom, its North American colonies, and its Native American allies. Historians in the United States and Canada see it as a war in its own right, but the British often see it as a minor theatre of the Napoleonic Wars. By the war's end in early 1815, the key issues had been resolved and peace returned with no boundary changes.
The United States declared war for several reasons, including trade restrictions brought about by the British war with France, the impressment of as many as 10,000 American merchant sailors into the Royal Navy,[5] British support for Native American tribes fighting European American settlers on the frontier, outrage over insults to national honor during the ChesapeakeLeopard Affair, and interest in the United States in expanding its borders west. The British government, which felt it had done everything in its power to try to avert the war, were dismayed by the American declaration, and believed it to have been an opportunistic ploy by President Madison to annex Canada while it was fighting a ruinous war with France. The view was shared in much of New England and for that reason the war was widely referred to there as Mr Madisons War. As a result, the primary British war goal was to defend their North American colonies.